The world of potty grooming can be very high pressure (pun intended), which can make parents exercise things no reasonable person would always exercise. But you do them anyway, considering a toddler holding in a poop wields more power than the mafia, and you will exercise anything to make sure that poop lands in the toilet, even if that means bargaining, lying, pleading, or crafting a cake entirely out of poo-shaped Tootsie Rolls. Information technology'due south the part the potty-grooming manuals forget to mention: You lot volition sacrifice every shred of dignity yous ever had, in a public restroom, and notwithstanding go back for more than, because you dearest them that much. Hither are merely a few examples of the depths to which parents have sunk.

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"My girl is terrified of toilets with automatic flushers, to the point where if she even sees 1 with a sensor (or annihilation she thinks might be a sensor), she'll flat-out refuse to become. I've tried covering them with Post-Information technology notes and making them little toilet paper hats, but sometimes even those tricks neglect. One day in the shop, I knew she needed to go and automated toilets were the only pick. Then I took her in the stall with me, pulled my pants downwards, and sabbatum on the toilet. Then I made information technology flush over and over and over, the whole time yelling, 'Encounter, babe? It'south OK! You can sit on the potty while it flushes and nothing happens! Everything is fine. Mommy's bottom is a little moisture but nothing bad is happening! See? See??' My butt was soaked and she still wouldn't utilize it." —Laura 1000., 34, North Logan, Utah

"I once squatted next to the highway in sub-nil temperatures during a snowstorm, blocking my three-year-quondam son so he could pee because he swore he couldn't await another second. We got back in and he said, 'Mommy, my butt has icicles!' and I said 'Mine, besides!' because at that place had been a huge gap between the bottom of my jacket and the top of my pants when I aptitude over." —Maria Y., 28, New York Urban center

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"My son was potty-trained during the mean solar day long before he was at night. One night, I was up tardily watching Telly when I heard a noise. I watched my son walk into the kitchen and open the fridge door. Earlier I could fifty-fifty inquire him what he was doing, he'd dropped his jammie bottoms and began to unleash the water hose that'due south attached to a bladder the size of Texas. I had to clean puddles of urine out of my fridge. Nothing similar rinsing pee off your produce to make y'all grateful for soap." —Sara L., 39, Dallas, Texas

"My potty-training son's poop is the size of an elephant's and information technology's constantly clogging our toilet. I've gotten so tired of plunging that I take resorted to cutting it into pieces with a plastic knife we keep by the toilet before flushing it, to save myself time and energy." —Carlie P., 29, Godfrey, Illinois

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"For whatever reason, my three-year-old son had the hardest time pooping. We tried everything we could think of and then took him to the doctor. They decided to run a bunch of tests, including i that needed united states of america to collect a stool sample from him. Only it couldn't be contaminated by a diaper or the toilet so we used a clean ice cream bucket that we stored in the exterior freezer until we could get it to the lab. That would take been gross enough on its own…until the day my father-in-police force got hungry and went looking for a snack. He came back within belongings the ice foam bucket, looking delighted. I've never seen my hubby move so fast!" —Jill R., 32, San Antonio, Texas

"My son did not want to potty train, at all. Whatever fourth dimension I asked him if he wanted to attempt, his excuse was ever 'Mama, I likewise little. My baby animals told me then', referring to his much-loved collection of little stuffed animals. So I had to assemble all 40 of his 'baby animals' in his room and sit down and explain to them why my son was big enough to potty in the potty. Yep, I was arguing with his imaginary friends. It worked though!" —Amanda T., 39, Atlanta, Georgia

"I tried everything to motivate my daughter to potty train, but she just didn't care. But with another baby on the fashion, I did! After ii weeks of accidents without any success at all, I did one of the shadiest — and possibly most desperate things — I've ever done equally a parent. Equally my daughter saturday rock-faced on the toilet, insisting she didn't need to pee while I knew darn well she absolutely did, I grabbed the jar of potty treat K&Thousand's and ate them by the handful in front end of her, all the while maxim through a mouthful of chocolate, 'Mommy goes pee on the toilet so I Become TO Eat ALL YOUR M&Thou's.' My daughter, horror all over her face, sobbed out 'OK' and and so finally peed! That's all it took. I handed her 2 One thousand&G's and she peed on the toilet from then on." —Kristen J., thirty, American Fork, Utah

"My oldest did fine peeing but he refused to poop in the potty because 'boys don't sit down on the potty.' Ugh! So, whenever he had to poop, he would put on one of his younger brother's diapers and poop in it. One 24-hour interval, I told him that if he could put the diaper on himself, he could change it himself, too. After sneaking upstairs and putting on a diaper and pooping in information technology, he told me to change him. I said nope, handed him some wipes and a garbage can and told him to do it himself. He started screaming that he would get a rash. All I could practice was sit backside the kitchen counter and muffle my laughter. He got so mad. Merely afterward that, he always pooped in the potty." —Diana Westward., 34, Bountiful, Utah

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"My girl is three and gets super attached to anything she thinks is hers. So now that she'due south potty grooming, she hates flushing her poop down the toilet. She worked so hard to brand it! And she thinks it'south and then pretty! And then nosotros can't simply flush it abroad forever! We compromised by having me take a picture on my camera phone of every poop she does. Then she describes it and gives it a name. ('Rainbow bridge over the mermaid lake' was the last one.) Information technology'due south my worst nightmare that I'yard going to get out my phone somewhere and someone is going to discover it and meet a whole gallery of bowel movements and retrieve I've got some weird fetish or something." —Nicole R., 36, Atlanta, Georgia

"My four-year-former daughter was outside playing and didn't want to come up inside, and so she just pooped in a little sand bucket and kept on playing. She somewhen brought it to me and I had to take a overnice long talk near appropriate places to relieve yourself. I never thought I'd actually have to say 'nosotros don't poop in sand toys' but being a mom makes you say lots of things you never thought you'd take to say." —Amanda S., 33, Denver, Colorado

"My daughter was about two years old and mostly potty-trained, although she would sometimes even so have poop accidents. One time, she said she was going to bake a chocolate pie in her play kitchen, just instead of making a pretend pie, she made a — you guessed it — poopie pie. Even after I cleaned it, that toy oven was never the same." —Stacey 50., 34, Dickinson, North Dakota

"Potty training and road trips are the worst combination ever. Recently, my v-yr-old pooped her pants on a car trip in middle-of-nowhere Wyoming considering we couldn't detect a gas station. She had to sit in it (in her poop-smeared car seat) for twenty minutes until we establish a rest end. All information technology had was a toilet and a metal sink. I had to clean off all the caked-on crap using my bare easily. I still want to dice, just thinking about it." —Ellen C., 35, Longmont, Colorado

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"With four small kids, grocery shopping is already the blight of my beingness. Simply now that I'g potty training my three-yr-old it's and then much worse. She constantly has accidents in public (at home she'south 100 percentage fine!), so I always carry spare undies and wearing apparel with me. But 1 day she went through all the spares so wet herself again. Exasperated, I took her dorsum to the bathroom, tipped her upside down, and dried her piffling bum under the manus dryer. I was just about to put her down and start drying her panties when a adult female walked in. She took one await, spun effectually, and walked right dorsum out." —Laura H., 37, Syracuse, New York

"My two-year-old son was potty training and got super constipated. He seemed to be in a lot of pain, so I chosen the pediatrician. Because information technology was late, and so I got the nurse on telephone call. She told me I could take him to the ER and spend two hours and $200 or I could take a baby spoon — the kind covered in safe on the end — and gently insert it into the opening of his rectum to stimulate it. I did it. Information technology worked. Simply the simply good thing I can say almost it at present is at least he was too young to remember it. Probably? I promise?" —Amy B., Los Angeles, California

"I told my son if he could get a whole mean solar day with no accidents, I'd make him a treat. But if he could get a whole calendar week and so we'd have a party. Well, he fabricated it the whole week with clean pants. He decided he wanted a poop party (of grade he did). Then I made a chocolate cake covered in brown frosting and Tootsie Curl logs, decorated with brownish crepe paper and balloons, and he got a blimp poop emoji. Worth it." —Jessica South., Oklahoma Metropolis, Oklahoma

"When my daughter was potty training, she would sit forever on her little toilet, reading, singing songs, whatsoever. But she never produced anything! Ane twenty-four hour period, I left her on her plastic potty to go starting time dinner. All all of a sudden, from backside me, I hear 'Mommy, I has supwise for you!' I turn around to see my girl holding a perfect mound of turd in her easily. She was so excited to prove information technology to me so I tried to exist excited, besides, as I steered her to the bathroom. I put my hand on the doorknob to open up the door and that was when I discovered that every door, low-cal switch, and wall she'd touched on her trip to evidence me was covered with poop. And now my hand was, too. That was a long day." —Natalie P., 36, Seattle, Washington